


show me the real you

by duelbraids



Series: edcl week 2020 [1]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: F/M, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Black Eagles/Golden Deer Joint Route, It's Mentioned Once, Mentions of Torture (very light), Soulmate AU, implied? berniethea but i'm not gonna tag that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-08
Updated: 2020-07-12
Packaged: 2021-03-05 02:08:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25066684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/duelbraids/pseuds/duelbraids
Summary: prompts: secrets, trust. day one and day five. edelgard and claude are soulmates, with the weight of fodlan on their backs.
Relationships: Edelgard von Hresvelg/Claude von Riegan
Series: edcl week 2020 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1821100
Comments: 26
Kudos: 80
Collections: Edelclaude Week





	1. Chapter 1

Khalid wonders if his soulmate knows he exists. His mom had told him the superstition when he was young, very young, and he decided to play along, thinking she was just going to play a prank on him. Like when they got in the washroom, she would start making ghost noises or something. Instead, he’d found out that he had a soulmate, somewhere out there, a pretty girl with freckles and brown hair, who had a mischievous look, at the time. 

He was maybe eight, and she was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. “Did you meet baba like this?” he had asked, but Khalid cannot remember the answer. He was too busy hearing music that wasn’t there and being mesmerized. 

Almost immediately, he tried to think of new ways to make this work. If it was him, a flame, and a mirror that made the girl appear, how far could he stretch it? He discovered that it only worked in the older mirrors - those, he’d discovered, used a silver filament over the glass to reflect, but newer mirrors, cheaper mirrors, used tin or something else. They reflected in a stretched, strange way, and the girl wouldn’t show up. 

So, silver filament mirrors were a requirement. He then tested if the  _ shape  _ of the mirror mattered. Khalid bought a handheld, folding mirror, confirmed it had a silver coating, and that night, he took a little candle to the mirror. That time, the girl appeared and she was reading a book, with a candle sitting on her bed, under her comforter, all miniaturized.

Pocket mirrors were allowed, and he checked that experiment off his list. The next involved types of candles and colors, all of which worked - tallow, beeswax, scented or not, they all worked, so long as they were candles with wicks. Matches, however, did not work. They went out too fast for him to even make an attempt. He had one more hunch, but...

“Hey, Nader?” he had asked one day, over a light lunch. Khalid tore a piece of taftun off, and put it in his mouth, “Can you teach me fire magic?” 

“You lookin’ to get my ears boxed, Khalid?” Is what Nader responds, “Even if I could, your mom would tie me up by the hairs of my beard for trying.”

“So…” Khalid responds, a sort of flat smile on his lips, “You can’t teach me?”

“No!” Nader stares at him for a moment, in disbelief. “Why even ask? Have you been gettin in more fights, kiddo?” 

“Pssh.” Khalid breathes out quickly, “No.” it’s a  **very** bold faced lie - the kids loved to single him out, after all, but he wasn’t asking about the fire for that. “I wanted to test something.” 

Nader snorts, “Let me guess, figuring out how to make potions on the go?” 

“Now there’s an idea…” Khalid mutters. 

And in intent, rapt horror, Nader shakes his head, “Oh gods, I’ve given him an idea.” 

* * *

The girls are perhaps fifteen, sitting in a parlor. Edelgard had been through much the past few years, and was barely a waif of a thing, in recovery. Still unused to all the new things about her life, like how she would be racked with pain without warning, her sudden, intense longing to always be outside, and the loss of her right index finger. It had been severed at the first knuckle, and replaced with a plasticine approximation. She’d learned to keep it a secret, under her gloves - no one could tell the difference, except for the learning curve of how to use it. People were kind, though, the lie that her siblings had died to a plague and that Edelgard was still on the mend made them forgiving. Especially her current guest.

The Varley girl had been brought alongside her father, and Edelgard had been tasked with entertaining her. Bernadetta, sweet thing, apologized near constantly. They lapse into silence, and then Bernadetta asks quietly, “So,” with a squeak, “Have you met your soulmate? I know most people never do, but-”

“My wh-” Edelgard rolls her eyes, “Soulmates aren’t real, Bernadetta, what foolishness are you talking about?” 

Now, to be fair to Edelgard, her eldest sister - the one who’d practically raised her - had given up soulmates early on. She had studying and training to do, so one day she will take her place as Emperor. Similarly, the next two, after, had also given up thinking about soulmates. They’d need to marry someone important, anyways, guarantee power for the family. And so on and so. No one had bothered to tell her this tradition. And ever since the torture and the unspeakable agreement she had made, Edelgard didn’t have the time to consider it as more than a fairytale. 

“Your soulmate, er, your majesty,” When Edelgard looks even more puzzled, Bernadetta scrambles to explain, “You know, the person you see when you take a candle and you hold it up to a mirror.” 

“It’s a myth.” She responds, sort of blaise faire. 

“Well, of course, you’re right,” poor, frightened Bernadetta began self chastising, “Bringing up a silly myth to the princess, what was Bernie thinking,”

“Hey, hey,” Edelgard moved off her chair, to only awkwardly stand slightly closer to Bernadetta, “Uhm,  _ please,  _ stop, I c-command you,”  _ Yes, perfect, Edelgard, that totally works. _ She’s panicked too, now, because Bernadetta was her guest, and her uncle would be  _ horribly  _ angry if she had been a bad host, always finding a reason to criticize her, “W-why don’t we try it?” Yes, Edelgard tells herself, this is clearly the way to stop Bernadetta’s tangent. 

Bernadetta perked up, “Yes, of course!” and Edelgard breaths a sigh of relief.

Not but five minutes later, they are cooped up in a tiny washroom, the doors closed tight, the curtains drawn, and a long, tapered candle in Edelgard’s hand. She almost drops it, but manages not to. A floor length mirror rests against the wall, and Edelgard stares at it. “Is there… anything I’m supposed to say… or?” 

“Nope.” Bernadetta spoke quickly, and then sighed. “Usually, she shows up about a few seconds in.” 

“Oh, you’ve seen your soulmate, then?” Edelgard asks, shuffling. Her white dress reflected back the candle’s light. “What’s she like?”

“She’s a singer.” Bernadetta responded, a little too quick. “With really pretty, long brown hair, and her voice is so clear and silvery,” 

Bernadetta has continued on, but Edelgard doesn’t hear her words anymore. Just like Bernadetta said, the mirror’s image had flickered with the candle, and she’s not looking at herself. He’s a well dressed boy, in finery that’s foregin to Adrestia, but still beautiful, and he’s exactly her age. He looks like he’s deep in thought, playing some board game, and she can tell someone is interacting with him - they appear like a periphery, moving a piece. Edelgard cannot help but hear strings in her head, like her heart is the rhythm to a song, one that’s never been heard before. Her face burns. “Can he see me?” tumbles out of Edelgard’s mouth, before she even thinks about whether she wants to reveal that information.

“And we met once at the- Huh?” Bernadetta tilts her head, and then answers, “No, not right now. Soulmates can only see each other when they both look in the mirror at the same time, both with a candle. It’s rather hard to organize. People usually try at midnight, but Bernie thinks that’s silly, what if your soulmate lives in a different timezone.” 

“I see.” she comments, torn between looking away and watching until the candle had burned down. She had too much, too much to do and too much to be - the expectation of war and schemes all weighing on her, barely old enough to comprehend the idea. But then, just as she is too young for war, she’s at the perfect age to fall in love with an idea. So she just studies him, up and down, watching him almost make a move in his game, before thinking better of it, and doing something else. 

“So…” Bernadetta chimes.

“So.” Edelgard’s voice is barely a whisper, like she’s out of breath. 

“What does he look like?” 

“He’s beautiful.” Again, the words come out unbidden, and Edelgard wonders if she should cut her traitor heart out, if it wished to tattle like this. “I-” She’s reeling and searching her brain for words that don’t sound like mush, “He’s like a lighthouse, and I’ve been at sea this whole time.” 

After a poorly muffled snicker from Bernadetta, she turns even pinker, and snuffs the candle. Her soulmate’s image flickers, and right as it does, his head turns towards her, and it feels like his green eyes meet hers in a jolt of electricity.

* * *

By the time he was fifteen, Khalid had collected ten or so different silver coated mirrors, many of which were small, one of which sat on the floor in his room, and another hanging in the hall. This was amongst a million other distractions he’d grabbed, from tinkering parts to spy glasses and anything that kept him shut up in his room or an office. 

Everytime he had tried a new mirror, he’d see something terrible. At this point, he wonders if his soulmate is even alive - most of the time, he had seen her as a bloodied pile of cloth with brown hair. But then, Khalid only had so much space to worry about the girl whose name he didn’t know (But was destined to love, that’s how this whole soulmate thing worked, and sometimes if he stopped experimenting, he could hear her singing despite having never heard her voice. He knew people talked of how love was an enchantment, but this was a little out there.) 

Khalid didn’t have it easy. If he stopped moving, he would realize how dreadfully lonely he was. He wasn’t Almyran enough for them, and worse, he reminded them of Fodlan. The same Fodlan saw them all as uncivilized - and this, from a people that invaded them for spices they apparently didn’t use! It was cruel, and it was unjust, considering he’d never stepped foot in the place, yet. 

Khalid had an idea hatching in his head, as he collected more ingredients to fiddle and fuss with. 

Eventually, though, this collecting had come to an end, when he ventured to Fodlan for the first time. His uncle had died, and he demanded to go. He couldn’t bring his copper spyglass, those were banned entirely. He couldn’t bring the oil he used to grease the machines he’d made, for that was banned too. Though not banned, his mother gave him such an earful for the belladonna he’d collected, so he didn’t bring that either. He could, however, bring his pocket mirror, and he hoped it didn’t break. It was hard enough to source. He’d joked to his mother that fun must be banned in Fodlan, and she told him not to say that once he was there. 

Khalid, now Claude, had learned  _ many things  _ **very quickly.** Fodlan looked like hell from his point of view - could he return to appeasing people by being funny, but in a place with running water and his spyglass? Ah well, he was suddenly thrust into the spot of being  _ Claude von Reigan,  _ unsure if he likes the name and unsure about all this. It was a way in, though. 

Khalid was past Fodlan’s throat, a place so few like him had been (without being beheaded.) 

For the first few months, he didn’t check his mirrors, instead focusing on bonding with his new Grandfather (who didn’t quite hate him, but didn’t quite know how to relate with him either. Fair enough, he supposed, putting up yet another wall between himself and those around him.) He already knew Fodlanic well enough, and started studying what his grandfather deemed “required reading” materials. 

Claude had decided, very quickly, that this church was bullshit. But he didn’t say it aloud. 

Instead, he skirted around it. He did not say  _ amen  _ at the end of prayers, but mouthed it, so no one would say a word to him. He certainly didn’t pray to Serios or Sothis, but instead his own gods. Claude was  _ very  _ homesick, and it made him feel a bit better. But he had to keep it secret. 

Finally, one day, as they played chess, his grandfather asked, “Did your mother ever teach you about soulmates?” 

“Yeah.” Claude responds, moving a piece. “We have them in Al- Back home, too. It’s not  _ just _ a Fódlan tradition.” He could regale a story about the noble boys who found out they were each other’s soulmates, but then, he thinks his grandfather doesn’t care. 

“Good.” They lapsed into silence, again, as Claude captured the white king. So his grandfather then tried again. “Do you know who she is?” 

“No.” He moves another piece, suddenly aware of the weight of the mirror in his pocket. “My best bet is that she’s not in Fodlan.” he finds himself lying, unsure as to why. 

His grandfather then sighed, and said, “Now, you must know that if she’s not of  _ our standard-”  _

“Yes, I know, the family name.” Is a fool’s errand, but he keeps that part conveniently clipped. He absent mindedly grabs, and flips open, the mirror. For a moment, as he turns his head back to his grandfather, to be lectured about nobility and his obligation to ensure crested heirs, he sees a ghost of a thing with white hair, staring at him, adoringly. 

* * *

_ It’s 2AM, Edelgard.  _ She berates herself, a month later.  _ You saw him once, in a mirror, and you are now letting him get in the way of your sleep.  _ She would then sneak into the bathroom, and see, maybe, if he was looking for her too. 

He never was. 

Four months go by, and she’s still thinking about him. About the game he was playing - how he considered each move, and while it was silly to dwell on. She tells herself it's because she had so little else to focus on. It was planning a war that she had no choice in, or, she could daydream about the boy, and his game, and the book she remembered sitting next to him. What else could be expected of her, she’s just a teenager. Just a teenage girl, holding her bear stuffy tight to her chest, wondering when the warm, welcome feeling will pass. 

Her soulmate was lonely. That was a weird thing to know, Edelgard thought. He was always around people, there always seemed to be a pair of hands or him looking at someone, but there was a lack of connection. He did not touch others, and he did not allow others to touch him. Her soulmate, who likely lived seas away and whom she would never meet, was lonely. She was too. 

Another seven months, (making it a year since she first peeked into that damn mirror.) Now her time is  _ occupied,  _ with plans of going to Garreg Mach, of infiltrating the monastery from the inside - and how? As a student, of course. Though Arundel phrased it as the best place to “put” her, she doesn’t think he realizes the secret excitement she has for leaving. Almost a year away from her uncle, away from those who slither, away, no fear around every corner? 

Edelgard doesn’t realize, yet, that the fear is now baked into her very being, and will stay there, scarred into her psyche. 

No, now, she has two things that make her feel like a normal girl. Excited to go to school and excited to fall in love. If she isolated those two facts about herself, she  _ might  _ appear to have a nice life, cushy and happy. 

Pretending, of course, she knows she’ll be playing at school and that she won’t meet her soulmate. She wraps the new cut on her forearm. Yet another present from Arundel. 

* * *

For months, they just barely miss each other. Edelgard giving up and pinching out her candle just as soon as Claude begins to look for her. They see the other flicker, but assume it’s their imaginations. The brushes become less and less frequent, as they both ready for their time at the academy. Time is hurdling them forward, ever forward.

Claude is stopped on the road - the carriage ride from Deirdru to Garreg Mach taking longer than expected due to some rain. It’s a quiet inn, and his grandfather had decided to stay behind, so he had most of the time to himself. He’d caught up on some light reading, had some tea, and now, as he settled into bed, he decided he might try his soulmate, one last time. 

When she flickers to life, fire is playing at the end of her fingertips, and she, too, is looking into the mirror. 

Well, that solved his age old query - it seemed a magic flame worked just like a candle. Her eyes go wide, as she surely realizes the same thing he’s worked out. Claude waves, and mouths, “Hi.” 

With her free hand, the girl waves back. He watches an idea spark, and she reaches past her mirror to grab something - the collar of her night dress bending with her, revealing scarring Claude is not sure he’s supposed to see. 

He thinks of the bundle of cloth, the girl bleeding from within. Before he can try and say - mouth - something, she drags a pad of paper into frame, and writes. “It is nice to meet you.” He notices that her hands are gloved. Maybe her fingers get cold. 

Claude laughs, out loud, and then quiets himself, realizing that there are some people who sleep at a normal hour. The two teenagers, however… He grabs his own paper, never far away, in case genius hits. “We haven’t met yet, technically,” he writes. 

She rolls her eyes, and he can’t help but wonder what she’s thinking. He’d seen bits of her, and she seemed so guarded. Perhaps that was the power of this song playing in his head - she’s swaying to it, after all. “I thought you might be the type to care about technicalities.” she writes. “Should we save our names for an in person meeting, then?” 

“No.” Claude shakes his head. He considers names for a moment, then, considers that they will never meet. That’s how most soulmates were. They were the ideal, the person that no one could compare to, and those who married someone else decided that it was okay, knowing they would always have this hanging, for their spouse would too. So, he writes out, “My name is Khalid.” 

“I like it.” She writes back, before returning her own name, “Edelgard.”

_ Huh,  _ he thinks,  _ just like the princess of Adrestia’s name.  _ Then, he thinks about the fact that, likely, once the little girl’s name had been announced, at least one hundred other little girls got named Edelgard. It’d happened with Khalid, after all, despite his mother’s unpopularity. Besides, what luck - bad luck, might he add - would that be? Telling the princess he’s going to be meeting tomorrow his true name. 

But normal people don’t meet their soulmates, and the conversation doesn’t go much longer, for Edelgard looks up, startled, and the flame on her fingers dies. Claude doesn’t let his candle go much longer, worried about what he might see.

* * *

Having settled her things away in her dorm, and with no responsibilities until tomorrow, Edelgard had decided to roam, with a sketchbook tucked under her arms. Dimitri, the Prince of the Holy Kingdom, had tried to approach her, and she had swiftly turned away. She did not want to meet anyone, not until the silly dinner she had to attend, where their uniforms would be passed out and their duties explained by Her Shadiness, er, her holiness. 

Eventually, she found the greenhouse, and decided this was a place no one would frequent. She thinks for a moment that this might be the first time in years she’s been truly alone. Hubert won’t show up until tomorrow, and in a way, the church was a safety net against those who slither, as they would only appear in disguises, and she knew who was where now. The only peace the alliance she’d been “talked” into gave her. 

For one, solid hour, Edelgard does not think. She does not think of war, and she does not think of pain, or change, or growth or even Khalid. She simply breathes, sketching the flowers mindlessly. Hilariously, she finds that her back aches less and that her normal hand cramps have faded, her prosthetic finger suddenly devoid of phantom pains. Or maybe that’s just the medicine kicking in. Knowing the only people around were servants who wouldn’t approach her, she even begins to hum. 

Of course, this is where it all goes wrong, because it is that same song, she heard two years ago now - two! Two years ago, when she was frail and recovering and Bernadetta had revealed something to her that could at least provide a modicum of escape. A false escape. And that, of course, led to daydreaming as she hummed, of the years after the war.

She doesn’t actually know what war is like, so her brain skips that part. 

Instead, she is at the part where her uncle is gone, where she is working on improving Adrestia, where some magic piece of paper is going to solve all the ills - realistically not that simple, but this is her daydream world, that she’s built specifically for herself and no one else. And once that piece of paper goes into effect, Edelgard retires - magically, her hair is brown again and she is unscarred and she only dreams, never wakes up screaming. And she travels, until she meets him.

And in her daydream, Khalid is graceful and kind and brilliant, with a honeyed voice and a way with words. However, her daydream is completely interrupted by a  _ different  _ voice calling, “Hey, Princess,” as if it were her name, and she shuts her sketchbook, already sighing, already deciding that this boy who she’s not looked up at yet is going to be her worst enemy.

After all, couldn’t he respect that this might be the only freetime she gets! 

A perfectly stacked house of cards crashes without a sound, much like the thought that ends right there, as she stands to face her interrupter. She swallows, dry, studying his face as if he were brand new. “Hello. I-” she’s flabbergasted, not a good look, “You must be the house leader of the Golden Deer.” She says. 

Awkwardly, he nods, and dips his head, “Claude von Reigan.” He’s clearly running calculations in his head - and Edelgard is running her own, and she’s terrible at math. Claude, but last night his name was Khalid, but she’s not going to say anything, because right now, neither of them will. Instead, she looks down at her sketchbook, realizes so suddenly that she had drawn his face, and shuts it quickly. 

He didn’t comment, instead saying, “And you’re the princess, Edelgard.” 

She scoffs, but it comes off so false and forced that neither of them believe it. “That I am.” What do people do when they meet their soulmate? No one told her this bit - they’d given her plenty of instruction on how to trick the other house leaders into trusting her and how to scare off the new professor and how to kill, but this?

This is far too much. “How was your journey?” Is the polite thing to ask, so she asks it. 

Claude, with some silly look on his face, laughs and says, “Well, it’s great, now that you’re here.”

Edelgard scoffs again, but this time it's genuine, “Really? Is that the best you’ve got?” she challenges. 

“Not in the slightest.” he returns, “How about I show you over chess, after dinner?” 

Edelgard ignores that the timeframe would set them breaking curfew, and instead nods her head, feeling at once both at ease and absolutely petrified, “You’re on, Claude.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi!! i know we're all excited about edelclaude week, and i sure as hell am. i'm going to be doing a bunch of different AUs this week, and i can't wait to share them all with you!


	2. Chapter 2

Claude knew he had made a terrible mistake when Edelgard had shown up at his door with a boxed chess set. The dinner had lasted long past its time, the awkward prayer after even worse. As soon as the Archbishop had left the room, Edelgard had started coughing, which made the silence dissipate as Claude started to laugh, and Dimitri had tried to chastise them both for being disrespectful. Instead, Edelgard had chuckled gingerly, and wished them both a good night, curtly. 

But, now she’s here, with the chess board. The girl, who he’s pretty certain he was never supposed to meet, who had kept hush about his name so far. Then again, he knows he has his own leverage on her, her own secrets. So perhaps they’ll both just keep quiet, and then return to their perspective places in society, only meeting whenever the three prospective leaders  _ had  _ to. 

Or they could say something. Stop playing games, perhaps even try their hand at this emotional vulnerability thing. But neither will, and instead: 

“Do you still wish to play?” she asks, voice hushed. 

He rubs his eyes, and then, “Yeah,” He welcomes her in, quietly checking behind her. There are no guards, no one who would catch them breaking curfew. “Even though it’s…. Pretty late.” He sounds more stern than he means to.

“Just a light sleeper,” she lies to him, and such a bold faced one at that. 

Claude just nods and agrees, before pulling two chairs out, around his little table. She places the board down, and starts setting things up. He notices her lack of gloves, the scars he’s seen a thousand times, and yet the first time he’s seen them in person. Things that would faze and perhaps worry another - a functional prosthetic finger, one he knows isn’t technology possible in Fodlan, and were even untested, clunky things in Almyra - he simply lets slip. He’d be a bad host if he said anything about them, so he just mentions, “You know, I think this is going to be a very interesting school year.”

“Yes.” Edelgard nods, before pointing at the board. “Well, the white army goes first, Kh-Claude.” She draws no attention to her mistake, and neither does he. 

They play in silence for a grand total of five minutes, before Claude starts with, “So, princess, is chess your favorite pastime?” 

“Certainly the most agreeable one.” she responds, moving her piece. “And for you?”

“Likewise.” He responds, beginning a feint. He wants to see if she will underestimate him too. “Your move.”

And here, she eyes him with suspicion, and he realizes that he’s being seen through. She moves her piece, in a way to prepare for whatever he might hold. “You certainly make the most interesting moves.”

“Well, I’m an interesting man,” he says, in a bout of faux confidence. In truth, he felt rather plain sometimes, like maybe there was a reason no one had liked him as a kid. He moves his next piece, still continuing the feint. 

“I will give you that, Claude,” she plays her piece. “You are, indeed, an interesting man. Well, boy.” 

“Doesn't that makes you just a girl?”

“I never said I wasn’t.” And with that, she says, “Checkmate.” 

Claude, jokingly, grabs his chest as if he’s been struck with an arrow - he watches Edelgard flinch, but can do little about it, continuing with his joke, “Ah, you’ve captured my king just as you captured my heart.”

Edelgard, for all her wit, freezes, turns pink, and Claude considers that a victory. “What?” 

“Just a joke, Princess.” he reminds, before starting to pack up the board. “That was a good game,” he says. Part of him, a part of his brain that’s hidden under the layers and layers of fear, is begging her,  _ please, just say something about us.  _

“Yes, it was. Thank you.” Instead, always instead, never just doing what they should. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning, Claude.” 

* * *

Edelgard learns why people don’t meet their soulmates; her heart can’t stop pounding, her face is flushed and she can barely focus on Lady Manuela’s classes. She finds herself thinking about him - thinking about how she’ll someday have to tell him, let him in on the secret of Those Who Slither, give him the chance to join her, as she will the rest. 

And some deep, intrinsic part of her knows he would never. She knows that the appearance of a jovial, good spirited boy with no enemies was too important. The Alliance was too politically divided, and the more she gets to know him, the more she realizes Claude would probably devote his time to keeping the Alliance neutral. Especially with the whispers around him, he had to play it safe. Besides, she is just as guilty as they are, her silence being condemnation. Why would Claude ever want to help her?

So he was no help, she has decided for him. She tells herself, she should shut him out now, before she really starts to care. Unluckily for Edelgard, her heart had already attached so wholly that she would never succeed. She would try for a few days, and fail miserably, because suddenly, the next free day they would have plans to go to the market or to do chores together or… Anything. Any reason to be near him was good. 

Claude thrilled her, and it felt like every time she talked to him, her heart swelled. Talking over tea, happy even when he intentionally irritates her. He could go on for hours, his head was full of ideas and schemes and Edelgard, selfish girl, wants to hold all of them to her chest, protect them. She wants to pick apart his brain and let him do the same to her. 

Except when these outings were over, all Edelgard could feel was racked with guilt. The guilt over the war, over taking Those who Slither’s war and making it her’s, was it not enough? Did her conscious have to haunt her with the boy she was falling hopelessly, effortlessly in love with? Must she spend at least an hour just thinking about him, sitting on her bed and wishing it weren’t true? 

Now, though, it’s not just moping over an outing. It’s not just looming, impending doom. She had watched the betrayal on his face and was hit with how it was for her. It doesn’t matter how far away she is now, she curls into her bed and cries, brings herself to tears and just  _ wails,  _ if only because there’s no one around to hear. Her head aches from it, and she’d always thought herself incapable of this, of feeling so much. 

She was learning there were many things she was wrong about.

Holding her pillow tighter, Edelgard bites it to silence a sob. Being heartless would be easier, because she knows him, knows he’ll see through any mask that isn’t made of steel. Because she wouldn’t  _ want  _ him to see her, she wouldn’t want to march across the room, and stare into her mirror. But she does. 

* * *

Claude learns why people don’t meet their soulmates; because they can still betray you. He shouldn’t even be surprised - this is clearly why she never mentioned the  _ situation _ to him. Professor Eisner had taught in their classes that any ally can turn out to be your enemy. And it’s certainly true, when she takes off the mask and the girl is forgotten, for now she was an enemy of the church. 

Lovely. He thinks it’s rather fitting, that even his soulmate would turn out to be someone who would leave him. Claude lived a lonely life, full of walls and mazes and people he pushes out. For a few hours, he racks his brain for any cryptic clues she’d given him. Furtive glances or stolen looks or maybe even something she’s said, but none of it comes to mind.

Lonely once more, he wonders if it was planned from the beginning. Not the soulmate thing, no, no one has control over that, but this? Did she come to Garreg Mach just to tear it down from the inside? There aren’t many seventeen year olds whose first thought to solving anything is war, so why would it be hers?

He lays in bed, knowing that there’s talk of an invasion of the monastery, and yet, can only think about her. Her ideals, they’re very in line with his, they could work hand in hand, if not for all the things her allies have done - doesn’t she realize, she’s just as culpable as them? He  _ wants  _ to think she’s better than that, that there’s something even more untold. 

But he can’t do anything with untold information. He can’t reach out to someone who's hiding from him. He can speculate, but no one will listen to that. He can wish he’d at least kissed her on their last date. But he didn’t. 

It’s a sudden urge, to take the standing mirror in Hilda’s room, just commandeer it for an hour, and grab a candle. And he doesn’t fight that urge, too upset and too desperate for answers. He brings the standing mirror back to his room, unseen, and returns to where he was sitting. 

At this point, he realizes that what he’s doing is akin to spying, more or less. It’s not like he could really learn any important information from seeing her in the mirror, and he... needed to satisfy some curiosity. He justifies to himself that he’ll only look for a few moments at most. Hopefully, he’ll see her cold and austere, and his heart will harden right back up, so he can build another gate around it. 

Instead, she’s curled into bed, holding a pillow and crying. A wave of far too many emotions washes over him, because he thinks, of all the times he’s seen her in the mirror, she’s never cried before. Not like this, and definitely not recently. And before he can leave her to her privacy, he sees her stand, cross the room and light her own candle.

All he sees is her eyes go wide in dawning horror, still red and puffy and full of tears. “I- Edelgard-” he speaks, as if she can hear him. 

“Khalid.” she mouths, glancing back and forth between her candle and him. 

He grabs a piece of paper, and quickly, writing down, before she can disappear, “Meet, now, woods outside Garreg Mach.” 

Comforted by watching her nod, Claude turns away. There are so many questions for him to ask, and so many words that they both of them need to say before they simply disappear into the wind. He moves to get ready, hurried.

* * *

Edelgard had a hell of a time convincing Hubert to leave her to do this alone, and given that it took her a good ten minutes to clean up, she was already running late. Hopefully, Claude hasn’t given up on her and gone back to his dorm. When she sees him, she’s not sure if it’s a relief or only makes her more anxious. With her heart in her throat and all of her worries in her hands, she approaches him, and quietly, quieter than she expected, she says, “My apologies, I couldn’t quite escape Hubert so easily.” 

For everything that had happened, for everything that was between them, for how much Edelgard is certain he must hate her now, he snorts out a laugh, “Some things never change.” 

“No. They don’t.” Her voice doesn’t have much humor - her heart pounded with longing to laugh with him, to be in his light. “Claude, why did you call me here?” 

“Well, we’ve got a lot to talk about, don’t you think?” And there’s the tone she expected more, a bit harsh, biting. 

Shame rises, “Yes, we do.” She knits her hands together, and swallows. Ten thousand thoughts buzz around her head, but she starts with the most obvious, “We must come to… some agreement about…  _ this. _ ” 

“This?” Claude answers back, and she knows he’s trying to infuriate her, “What ever could you mean, Princess?” 

“You know damn well what I mean, Claude.” She bites back. 

“No, Edelgard, I don’t know what you mean. I feel like I barely know you at all, anymore.” He crosses his arms over his chest. 

She thinks she deserves this. The hatred, the bitterness, perhaps it’s just what she gets for not telling the truth to him, to her friends, to anyone. She can only blame her fear of Those Who Slither so much. “Fine,” Edelgard dry swallows, “Let us talk about this soulmate business.”

Claude gestures to her, and Edelgard knows she’ll have to start. Fair enough, she thinks. Nearly heartbroken, she tries to harden herself. “Well, think of it this way, Claude. If you are not with my cause, then you are against me, and with… How we are, what’s stopping you from grabbing a mirror and spying on my battle plans?”

“The same thing that’s stopping you, Edelgard. Absolutely nothing.” The way he says it is revealing, revealing of the hurt he normally hides. “Who says I’m against you?” 

“You, namely.” 

“Can you blame me?” 

“No.” and she realizes she must sound so miserable, her shoulders shrugged. “I cannot. But we have to come to some agreement, here.” 

Sighing, he nods. “Yeah.” Claude shakes his head, “It’d be too easy just to ask that we both never reach out to each other.”

“That is a _ lot  _ of trust to put into your enemy, Claude.” She comments, “All we have are each other’s words.” 

And, like an arrow through her heart, he says, “I’d  _ like _ to trust you, Edelgard.” 

“Well, you can’t.” She starts, her voice catching in her throat. “I cannot trust you, and you cannot trust me.” 

“I could if you just  _ talked to me. _ ” Frustrated, Claude runs his hands through his hair. 

She hates it, because she knows he’s right. She hates that she didn’t take the initiative herself, she hates that it took  _ this.  _ Accusing herself did no good, though. And neither would what comes out of her mouth, “Well, what do you want me to say? Sorry for not telling you I was planning to go to war with the church, I was trying not to get caught and executed.” 

“Now _you’re_ playing dumb, Princess.” He alleges, and perhaps he’s right, perhaps she’s obfuscating what she knows is the real issue. “Don’t you think I want the church gone, or even _fixed,_ if no one will accept gone? Don’t you think I’m tired of being seen as less than human, because they believe Sothis only made Fodlanic people?”

“Then why won’t you just  _ help me? _ ” 

“Because you won’t let me!” he’s right, she knows it, she hates it, “Because even when I’ve tried to understand you, you won’t let me know a single thing. Because your allies make humans into monsters, and I’m not willing to have their blood on my hands.”

“You think I do? You think I do this because I want to?” She tells herself,  _ don’t cry,  _ but her face feels hot, and she’s growing to despise that too. Trying to make her whole body stop shaking, she tries cruelty, once more, “Nevermind, I cannot change your mind.” 

“And you never will, if you stay in your head!” Claude’s jaw is set, a hard line. “I’m going to give you this one chance, Edelgard, tell me the truth. Who are your allies, why won’t you just  _ turn  _ on them, if you hate them so much?” 

“You wouldn’t believe me.” Her words are a direct echo, a near mirror of what Arundel had once told her; no one will believe you, who's going to listen to a fifteen year old, raving about some shadowy group that killed her siblings. Edelgard would simply sound hysterical, and they would just send her back to Enbarr, back to Arundel. No one will believe you, no one will listen to a crazy little girl, he’d said, and Claude won’t either, so she defaults to what she tells herself, “I must follow this bloody path to free Fodlan.” 

“Must you?” 

“Yes! I’ll do whatever I must do! Whatever is required of me, whatever I have to do, until the Church no longer holds tyrannical power.” 

“Then what?” he challenges. “What do you do once you’ve driven the church out of power? Do you even  _ have  _ a plan beyond that?” 

“I-” She’d been trying to think that far ahead, but frankly - she couldn’t. Every day was simply getting past it, getting past the abuse, “I’ll figure it out. I’ll figure it out when they’re gone-” 

“They?” 

_ Fuck.  _ She doesn’t answer.

Claude waits, keeping silent, until she looks up at him. Having caught her in her lie, he begins, “Edelgard, I’m going to make an assumption that ‘they’ means your allies - they’re the same people who hurt you, years ago, aren’t they?” 

_ Damn you, Claude.  _ “You know about that.” Not a question, just a surprised statement, trying to not sound as panicked as she feels. 

“Hard not to.” He admits, and somehow, the pity on his face is worse than the anger from earlier.

She’s cursing herself, him, everyone. Her last chance to tell him, her last chance to reach out - to him and to her friends. But then, she could have been followed, her heart is pounding and her anxiety is running so high, that she asks, “Why should it matter?” 

“Edelgard.” Claude is coaxing her out, she knows it, she knows how he works around her walls and pulls her out of them, and she knows when he’s running out of patience too. It’s not like she has much energy to resist either. “Please, just tell me. Yes or no, nothing more.”

So, she replies, “Yes.” And with that, words start tumbling out of her mouth, words she wasn’t even sure she’d thought of until they came out of her mouth, “We - Hubert and I - have named them Those Who Slither in the Dark, they are an extremist remnant of the followers of Nemesis, they have been doing experiments on people, namely children, like myself and Lysithea for years, to try and create some perfect Emperor to destroy Fodlan, and the Church. They’ve replaced plenty of nobles within Adrestia’s court, my uncle included, so it’s not like I can stop them from-” she stops when she says that, staring at Claude, “-but I don’t have any power, any allies, not even any friends, so I need them.” 

It’s a truth she’s always known. Just as they had destroyed her, they had built her up too, made her into this weapon, a jagged dagger. But without them, she will never win. 

“Stop lying to yourself.” He doesn’t snap, but Edelgard flinches all the same, “You say that without them you wouldn’t have any allies, but you’re wrong. All of our friends have been talking about you, you know, and they agree with your ideas. You just need better methods.” 

“The war has already started, Claude, I can’t go back now. I already - I already  _ did  _ those things.” 

“So, you aren’t going to try?”

She pauses, “I didn’t say that!” 

“No, you definitely did.” 

“I don’t have a choice!” she tries again. 

Claude’s frustration with her is evident, as he pinches the bridge of his nose, eyes squeezed shut, “Everyone has a choice, Edelgard.”

They lock eyes again, and Edelgard’s go saucer wide. “You cannot possibly mean for me to - Claude, they would kill me before I get the chance. And even if they didn’t, fighting with just the Empire alone, the war would drag for decades, thousands more would die than necessary, and  _ I don’t have that kind of- _ ” She stops herself from saying that,  _ that kind of time. _ “At least underneath my command, I can minimize what Those Who Slither do to people.”

“Have they ever listened to you?”

“No, no, they haven’t.” It comes out as a bitter revelation, as she finally admits the lie she’s been telling herself “I thought I could control them, but-” 

“And here you were, chastising me for who I trust,” It stung, but it was true. Claude continues, “Besides, I never said you would be alone. Oust Those Who Slither, and the Alliance can be behind you. Of course,  **you** will have to go to each duke, explain your position, and there’s a very good chance that Gloucester, along with those who follow him, will revolt.”

“Those Who Slither will declare me a traitor, and at least try to place Thales, their leader, on the throne. The few… connections I do have, and those who believe in me, they will fight for the Empire, but,” She neglects to mention that Thales disguises himself as her uncle. That will come later. If she lives long enough. “We can plunge both of our countries into civil war, and be sought by a group who could be around any corner, for  _ what? _ ” 

“For the future of Fodlan, and humanity.” He really did speak her language, “Besides, you said they’re the followers of Nemesis, right?” 

Edelgard catches his implication like clockwork, “If we - If **I** oust them as such, then Rhea surely would want  _ revenge,  _ wouldn’t she?”

“And with the Church focused on Those Who Slither, that would-”

“Give us the time to make allies. Give us  _ time,  _ we could- We could centralize ourselves, take the monastery as a base, it’s perfect. We could- Actually do this.” she completes for him, her heart racing. There’s hope in her voice, hope that she hasn’t had since she woke up chained to a wall, nearly a decade ago. “Claude…” She trails off, and then moves closer to him. It’s really only been a week, and yet, she misses the feeling of holding him. “Claude, how do you know it’ll work?” 

He shrugs, “We just have to trust it does. There’s no guarantee.”

“You know how I am with trust.” she responds. 

“You trusted me enough to come out here, in the middle of the night, without Hubert, just because I asked you to.” He reminds. 

“Likewise, so did you.” She says it like that really means anything. She sighs, “Surely you get something out of this,” More unbidden words, speaking back to her fear.  _ You are always being used.  _

“Well, my soulmate, for starters?” he teases, and she rolls her eyes, not realizing that he’s made her smile again. “In truth, and I think you’ve got enough of a mind to guess, I do. Fodlan’s been closed to the real world, the world beyond its borders, for far too long, unless they’re taking over islands or killing innocents.” Edelgard nods with him, mind still reeling, “And it’s time those borders open, and it’s time people here learn that they aren’t better than the rest of the world. Of course, that starts at home, the inequality faced in Fodlan must be solved. If they can’t see their own people as equal, how will they ever see it for others? Of course, I think that  _ must  _ coincide with opening up. We should start trading, first, though - the fort at the locket would be perfect-” 

Without any warning, Edelgard’s whole being feels shaken, and she tells him, “I love you.” 

“What?” Claude blinks, once, twice, three times. “I’m sorry, what did you-”

“I love you.” She says it again, feeling incredulous. Revealing her teenaged side once more, she almost  _ babbles,  _ “I should have told you so long ago, but I kept getting myself trapped in my head, and I- I love you and I love your ideas and-”

“I love you too.” Edelgard cannot be more grateful that he shuts her up. And, like that, he starts walking towards the direction Edelgard came from. She stares, mouth slack. “We’ve got a lot of things to start planning, don’t we?” 

“Claude, go back to your dorm.” She warns, a sort of charitable smile on her lips, “You’ll know when it’s safe to come find me.” 

“What should I tell everyone else?” Claude reaches to take her hand. 

She squeezes back, gently. “That I miss them, and that I’ll make this right.” 

“Oh, disgustingly cheesy.” He comments, and Edelgard sees him debate something in his head, before eventually, he leans over, and kisses her forehead. Edelgard’s heart stops, for just a moment. 

She recovers, only a little late, “You really are one to talk, Claude.” 

“I can be perfectly poetic, I will have you know.”

“Perhaps you should show me, over chess.” 

Claude lets out one, quick breath, “You’re on. When we meet again.” An incomplete sentence, but she knows how it ends. 

_ When we meet again, it will be as rebels, as allies, as two fools in love, hoping to change the world.  _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hoooo boy, i hope y'all enjoyed that! it was incredibly fun to write, i must admit.


End file.
